Setting up a day-to-day routine

Hello everyone. I have been meaning to write for a long time, and I have had so much to share with you all. Whilst some information has been top secret until confirmed, the rest hasn’t been shared just from lack of time!

Below is an acknowledgement of my absence, and an attempt to explain it. I will try to keep it concise.

This past month has been an absolute whirlwind for Rubén and I.

New Apartment

One month ago, we moved into our rented one-bedder apartment that we now call home. Located in the very nice and equally expensive part of town, we have spent the majority of our weekends and weeknights making our place a livable location. When we moved in there was trouble with the gas, then the stove/oven, dripping taps and so forth, most of which are now solved through relentless negotiating with the real estate agent and tradies. We’ve had to buy all the things one needs when moving into a new place like containers for food, bed sheets, vacuum cleaners and *shock horror* even an iron. In the 4 units I’ve previously lived in, I have never, EVER bought an iron. Unfortunately for me, Rubén needs ironed shirts each day for his fancy new job.

All of my beds have used the quilt sewed by Mum.

Chest of drawers to double as a TV unit... Don't mind if we do!

Coffee table doubling as a Christmas decoration. My nativity from Bethlehem is looking mighty fine in its new Chilean home.

What is happiness? For Chileans, 4 hotdogs with drinks delivered for $18.

Dining room table against the red wall that I love! My prints from Israel and London on the wall. Blue shopping trolley aids in the weekly walk for the groceries.

Our teen-tiny kitchen.

Yep, what you see is what you get!

Bathroom, with a ridiculous shower-bath. Bathroom much bigger than the kitchen!

Our telephone, one of the few things in the house that we bought ourselves.

With working numbers, and difficult to hold receiver.

Doubles nicely as a glasses holder for Rubén each night.

New Job for Rubén

In thesame weekend we moved, Rubén started working. This has come with the usual challenges of adapting to a new workplace and learning the ins and outs of the role and organization. It has also come with the constant need to buy new business clothes for Stacey to iron. (I just can’t let it go!) I must say though, he looks super good in a suit :D

New Job for Me

In 2015, I will start my permanent, full-time job as a Primary School teacher here in Chile. I will be teaching a Year 1 class (Primero Basico) in a private, bilingual Chilean school very close to our new apartment. I will be teaching (in English) the subjects of Language and Communication (English), Mathematics, Natural Sciences, History, Geography and Social Sciences, with a specialist teacher teaching Technology, Art, Physical Education, Spanish and Scripture.

I am super excited about this new job, and will report more on it when it comes around!

British Camp

For the last two weeks I have been a Native English Speaker teaching Arts and English to 130 students(and one dog) from Year 2 – Year 7. The British Camp (at which there was not a single British person there!) was held in a private school in a suburb that translates to City of the Valley. The guy who named that city didn't have a tough job.

I worked alongside some really great Chilean teachers, Chilean high school volunteers and Native Speakers to have an incredibly enjoyable experience. When the students were asked to evaluate the best parts of the camp, Art, alongside cooking, was the most given response. It's easy to see that they enjoyed it by the dedication they put into their artwork each day.

I am actually speaking with someone, just hidden behind the girls working super hard!

The dog, however, wasn't so involved in English class (and prohibited in Art class).

The many hugs I received this afternoon to say goodbye and thank you was an absolute joy. This camp gave me the kick start to remember how much I love working with kids and has confirmed that I have taken the right step to look for a full-time job in teaching for next year.

Many thanks to the excellent teaching companions :)

To teach at this camp, I had to give up my 6-hours-a-week English classes in businesses. No big loss!

English Opens Doors

I applied for a UN/Government of Chile initiative to volunteer to work in an English camp for students entering high school in disadvantaged areas. The camp is run by Chilean volunteers (who are usually studying English), and native English speakers in Chile. This week I received an email to say I was successful in my application for this program and I will be going to camp for one week in January!

Notable Events:

Evacuation Drill

In this past month, I was involved in an Evacuation Drill in one of the businesses I was teaching English at. The class finished at 10am, and I headed over to the lifts to make my way down to the lobby at leave. This day, however, the elevators did not open for me, and at 10:02 an emergency siren sounded. Employees identified themselves as emergency wardens and mustered us all in a waiting area. An announcement signaled floor by floor who could leave the building. Eventually, us on level 20 were announced and I proceeded to walk down the 20 flights of stairs only to re-muster downstairs, until everyone was accounted for. Not only did it waste half an hour of my day I wasn’t getting paid for, but it definitely flared up my Achilles tendinitis ensuring walking badly for the following week!

Teleton

Each year, all of Chile’s free-to-air TV channels simultaneously stream a 29 hour telethon to raise money for children with disabilities. When walking home from work one day, I saw this really long queue with average looking people and policemen and their ‘army trucks’ that are used to detain arrestees. I joined the queue and received two tickets to see the humour section of Teleton. The tickets were for 12:30am – 3:30am on Friday night (Saturday morning).

Even though I had my Achilles problems, and Rubén was exhausted from his first week at work we manned-up and caught the last subway of the night to join the queue.

11:30pm: Joined a very long queue.

12:30am: The queue moved forward, a policeman checked our tickets and let us in to join another queue with view of a big screen to view the event.

2:30am: We finally advance enough in the queue to enter the building. 3 hours standing in the cold was not fun. The show, however, was running late so we hadn’t ‘missed’ what our session was supposed to be. Many were still behind us though who did miss part of it.

2:45am: We sit down in the studio audience. One of my goals to participate in an audience for a TV show before I’m 30 is now complete.

We saw a variety of stories of children who have been helped by Teleton, along with a comedian, bands and a skit. My goal to be seen on (Chilean) TV is complete.

 I’m looking at the screen at this moment so I knew I could stop pretending to laugh with the comedian I couldn’t completely understand!

5am: All public audience members were asked to leave. We walked back to the main road and took a taxi home and had a well-earned sleep well into the next day.

Meat Pie

I ate a meat pie. It tasted amazing. The photo is not amazing. It is an excuse to go back.

 I probably won't be updating this before Christmas, so from Santa-Rubén and I we say ¡Feliz Navidad!